For the studio pocketbook's amusement, not the audience's.

I wasn't amused with "Amusement".The laughable synopsis on the cover
goes like that: Tabitha,Shelby and Lisa.They're longtime friends on
separate life paths.But they share a horrific destination when a
seemingly innocent incident from their school days comes back to
terrify them.Someone wants payback:warped vengeance...mind-games
vengeance...taunting,shredding,slashing vengeance.Inside a stone-walled
chamber of prison cells and mechanisms of doom,the three women and
other victims face a fierce fight to survive."Amusement" is
terrible.With dumb plot and zero scares it offers nothing even remotely
interesting even for seasoned horror fan.The killer is an
underdeveloped cliché with truly annoying laugh.There is only one
effectively creepy scene in which the emerging female lead is
confronted with a room stuffed with dolls and clowns.The violence is
tame so gorehounds and slasher fans will be disappointed.4 out of 10.

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75 out of 99 people found the following review useful:

Far below the average

To give this movie an above average rating is a waste of stars. Sure,
visually the movie looks nice and like most people mentioned the Clown
Segment is pretty creepy... BUT like everything else in this movie its
totally ripped off and leads nowhere. The whole basic premise of
"Amusement" with the subplots just doesn't work at all... Car lost in
the woods, Babysitter home alone and stalked by crazy guy, old
abandoned hotel with crazy people in it... you've seen it all before
and it isn't even bound together by a clever script. Far from that...
Chicks get abducted by some crazy guy, then some strange interrogation
in a FBI Cell takes place ... I guess just because they needed some
reason for the flashback sequences. Beside that the whole part is
idiotic... how could a psychologist fall for a crazy guy in FBI dress
with an interrogation room in an old flooded cellar??

"Amusement" is basically just a collection of ideas stuffed into a
messy script... Let's make a horror movie with beautiful chicks and a
crazy guy! OK, but I want a clown in there and Joyride was fun, so
let's also put that in and have some people being stabbed in the eye.
If we make the crazy guy an inventor with killer gimmicks and some Dr.
Giggles laughter I am in! OK, deal... but we need a psychologist in
there plus some unexpected twist and a moral ending to at least make it
look smart on first sight.

Phew...things build up, the whole reason for the movie title is
unfolded and pretty meaningless, the characters get killed in most
uninspired ways possible, the flashbacks are clumsy and don't explain
much and we never learn why people are sown into mattresses or crazy
guy has a fetish for pulling living things open. It just happens..
random shreds of stolen ideas like in a cheesy clip show.

THIS IS A MESS!! For the few scenes that work its 90 Minute too much
wasted and the ending should make anybody angry. Avoid!

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79 out of 109 people found the following review useful:

We are not amused!!!

This wasn't a very good movie, despite having some okay actors and some
above par production values.

The premise is that these three girls got their playmate into trouble
for torturing a squirrel to death when he was a kid, and now that he's
grown up, he arranges to have them all killed in very creepy ways. Most
of the scenarios defy plausibility. (The killer just HAPPENS to be
following his victim, whose boyfriend just HAPPENS to be following a
truck with a psycho truck driver and a truck stop hooker?)

Amazingly, none of these people think to do the sensible thing, which
is to call the police when they think something is amiss.

It's low grade torture porn, and if you're into that kind of thing, you
can watch this movie. But it telegraphs its suspense a mile away.

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55 out of 72 people found the following review useful:

Among the WORST movies I've ever seen

I was angry when the number rating scale didn't offer a "0" so I was
forced to give this movie an undeserved "1" instead. I am fifty-one
years old and this may be the biggest waste of time I've seen in my
life. There is no need to warn of spoilers in this review because there
is absolutely no plot to spoil. The acting was atrocious, the weak
excuse for a plot was filled with numerous holes and implausible
coincidences, and there was not a single shocking or scary scene
anywhere in it. The clown sequence was lifted from an old urban legend
that has been around for twenty years.

Avoid this piece of garbage at all costs. The fact that his movie has
received an average rating of 5.5 means one of two things: 1. The
sensibilities of mankind are declining at a rate beyond belief.

or 2. The producers and principals associated with this movie have
spent a great amount of time writing bogus reviews to pump up the
ratings to dupe suckers into renting this trash.

Please save your money and your time--DO NOT RENT THIS MOVIE!!!

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52 out of 68 people found the following review useful:

Could Have Been Something

This movie started off decently, then slowly after about five minutes
it just goes down hill. The film has terrible acting and the characters
make the most idiotic choices. The plot, which no one can even
comprehend by the end of the movie, is just awful. Nothing makes sense
and you will be left scratching your head. The only scary part about
this movie is the clown. The clown is creepy and looks very original
and cool. If they would have focused on the clown, had a more defined
plot structure, and better acting...well it wouldn't have gone straight
to video. The whole film is just completely ruined, and with their
budget and scenery it could have actually been scary and cool. This is
a complete waste of your time, so please don't spend any money on this
garbage.

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65 out of 95 people found the following review useful:

Totally misleading DVD cover, and the movie would still be bad regardless...,

This movie was a big disappointment for a number of reasons. As
iterated in other comments, the DVD contains story elements that are
entirely absent from the film itself (i.e. the clown!) I thought the
whole film would be about that clown! well, not so my friends! The film
has no cohesive sense at all. Brainless. It was just sort of thrown
together haphazardly and without any thought. Also, as noted by other
reviewers, the characters were totally one dimensional, surfacey, and
straight up archetypes completely lacking in any development, depth, or
uniqueness.

To me, it seems like a really bad indie film that somehow got a lot of
funding and made it into DVD market. I feel like I can't really make
any comment on the acting because, honestly, I can't imagine any actors
or actresses who would be able to give this film the animation and
depth that it so sorely lacks.

At most average

After languishing for so long in 2008, Amusement is finally making its
debut on DVD. I had high hopes for the movie after watching the trailer
but it is nowhere near what I had expected it to be.

The movie can be summarized as a series of vignettes.Each vignette
tells the tale of three women and their encounter with a psychotic
killer, out to get them for they had done to him in the past. The plot
is similar to Valentine (2001) but the movie was weighed, measured and
found wanting.

For starters the editing could have been a lot better. The movie starts
off with the Shelby story when it could have been much better placed
when the psychiatrist questions Tabitha about Shelby. Another scene in
which Lisa tries to enter the hotel and accidentally breaks a bottle,
when the psycho steps out the bottle is still on the steps untouched
and in one piece.

The story was not impressive at all. The whole Tabitha portion of the
story of her babysitting her cousins and being attacked by the clown
was very similar to Halloween (1978). The back-story which told why the
psycho had such an animosity towards the girls in the first place
should have been well explained.

The characters where not plausible at all. For instance, when Lisa
sends her boyfriend to check on her friend at the hotel and when he
doesn't come out, she doesn't call the cops, she goes in herself. I
mean how stupid can you get. The movie is nothing more than a
compilation of several slasher movies made in the past all jumbled up
into one movie. No wonder why this movie never made it to the big
screen.

If you want to watch a good horror movie rent out Halloween(1978),
Psycho(1960) or The Changeling(1980)because this movie is nothing more
than another futile attempt by Hollywood to create a decent, original
horror movie.

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49 out of 71 people found the following review useful:

this film is nearly as bad as the writers remakes

A mildly bullied kid grows up and decides to get even with the trio of
girls (yes girls) who bullied him by scaring them before brutally
killing them in the uninspired, clichéd-ridden horror film. Visually it
looks better than the budget the film had, but that's about the best
thing i can say. The rest is trite and asinine. The victims act so VERY
stupid in their actions that one can't help but actually root for their
deaths. I was kind of looking forward to this one, needless to say I
was disappointed. Well in all honesty, with the same writer that wrote
this the equally awful "Hitcher" & "When a Stranger Calls" remakes, I
should ave had diminished expectations from the onset.

My Grade: D

DVD Extras: Both widescreen & fullscreen versions of the film (I'd opt
for the 'neither' option) an anti-piracy PSA; corporate schilling for
Blu-Ray; trailers for "Alien Raiders", "Friday the 13th"; and trailers
for the X-box 360 games "Tomb Raider: Underworld" & "Project Origin"

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38 out of 55 people found the following review useful:

Horrible...so many plot holes

I thought this movie might be something, but even from the beginning
not only was it bad, it had so many plot holes! I don't think this will
spoil anything for anyone because it wouldn't make any sense anyways so
there's no way to guess any of it. in the first scene, when the
"amusement" guy is sneaking up on the "bad" man talking in the house,
why would the truck driver (the one on the phone) be inside the house
because for one thing, it's not his. And two, later on we find out it's
the "amusement" guys house (i'm sorry if i'm not making sense with the
"amusement"/"bad" guy titles but the movie wasn't significant enough
for me to remember their names. Also wrong with this scene is, because
it relies on the crazy girl throwing herself out of the truck, how
would anybody have known that she was going to do that? There is no
logical reason the "amusement" guy could have known she was going to
throw herself out. Later on, there's a therapist who's interviewing the
blonde girl, and in the middle of the interview she discovers (the
therapist) that shes in the trap of one of her old patients (the
"amusement" guy) she tries to escape but is killed, but how could she
not know that she wasn't in an FBI station when there's a maze of
pathways to get out, some of which lead to dangerous situations. She
would have to be a complete dolt not to recognize it as a trap. I've
tried to give her the benefit of the doubt. I tried to say she thought
it was a crime scene, but then why would they give the blonde girl
trauma therapy on site? Why was the "amusement" guy so stupid? Why does
he leave his weapons lying around where his "subjects" can easily get
them? It was stupid, boring, confused, and a complete waste of time.
I'm glad I only rented it. I could keep going about plot holes, but I
won't because i'd be here all day.

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30 out of 44 people found the following review useful:

The Plot Is So Unreasonable (Actually Absurd) that Irritates

While driving in a side road following a truck with her boyfriend Rob
(Tad Hilgenbrink), there is a strange accident and Shelby (Laura
Breckenridge) is abducted by a deranged driver. Tabitha (Katheryn
Winnick) is kidnapped from her uncle's house by a man dressed of clown.
Lisa (Jessica Lucas) is caught in an old pension by a twisted man. The
three women are former school friends from Briar Hills and sooner they
find themselves in an underground prison; further, they discover that
the abductor is a former school mate that had psychological problems
and is seeking revenge against them.

The plot of "Amusement" is so unreasonable (actually absurd) that
irritates. The first segment (Shelby) is dumb with unexplained
attitudes that do not make sense. For example, who is the girl in the
truck; why she writes a note asking for help and jumps from the truck
immediately after? Who would chase a truck with a dangerous kidnapper
in the middle of nowhere leaving the girlfriend and a wounded girl
behind on the secondary road? Why the truck driver runs over Rob? Why
did he stop in a creepy house if he was close to the gas station?
Tabitha's segment is the best and slightly inspired in the 1979 "When a
Stranger Calls", but uses the bad clichés with the woman running from a
backyard to a closed space and finding the body of the babysitter.
Lisa's segment is also terrible, and who would sneak in a frightening
place after the disappearance of her best friend Cat and her boyfriend
Dan inside the house? The annoying and insane criminal is not developed
and the viewer never knows how he got the isolated underground facility
and why the psychiatrist of Briar Hills would visit a patient in a
visibly abandoned spot. Last but not the least, the re-creation of the
art boxes by the maniac is simply ridiculous. The good points of this
flick are the cinematography and the acting, but that is not enough to
save the story. My vote is four.